1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a semiconductor device structure and the method of fabricating the same. More particularly, this invention relates to a memory device structure and the method of fabricating the same.
2. Background of the Invention
Typical flash memory cells use poly-silicon to form the floating gate. During programming, the electrons injected into the floating gate are distributed uniformly on the whole layer of the floating gate. However, when the tunnel oxide under the poly-silicon floating gate has defects, the device tends to have leakage current, resulting in reliability issues.
Thus, a memory device has been developed which has a structure of Silicon-Oxide-Nitride-Oxide-Semiconductor (SONOS). When the voltage between the word line and the buried drain is being programmed, the electrons in the channel and close to the buried drain region are injected into the silicon nitride layer. Since silicon nitride has a special property of catching electrons, the injected electrons do not distribute uniformly on the whole silicon nitride layer. They rather crowd and localize on the silicon nitride layer with a Gauss""s distribution. Because the electrons injected into the silicon nitride layer only distribute in a local region, the device is then not as sensitive to the defects of the tunnel oxide. As a result, it performs better with less leakage current.
FIG. 1A to FIG. 1C are cross-section process flow diagrams of an existing SONOS memory device.
Referring to FIG. 1A, a substrate 100 is provided first, where the substrate 100 has a memory cell region 120 and a periphery circuit region 130. Further, an oxide layer 102 is formed on the substrate 100. Afterwards, a silicon nitride layer 104 and an oxide layer 106 are formed on the oxide layer 102, and then the oxide layer 102, the silicon nitride layer 104 and the oxide layer 106 belonged to the periphery circuit region 130 are etched. A gate oxide layer 103 of the periphery circuit region 130 is grown by the wet oxidation method, without being grown in the memory cell region at this time. Then, at the same time, a poly silicon layer 108 is formed on top of the silicon oxide layer 106 in the memory cell region 120 and also on top of the oxide layer 103 in the region of the periphery circuit 130. A photo resist layer 110 is then patterned on top of the poly-silicon layer 108, covering the area where the gate structure is to be formed.
Referring to FIG. 1B, using the photo resist layer 110 as an etch mask, the stack of layers in the memory cell region 102 including the poly silicon layer 108, the silicon oxide layer 106, the silicon nitride layer 104 and the silicon oxide layer 102, as well as the stack in the periphery circuit region 130 including the poly silicon 108 and the silicon oxide 103, are patterned to form a gate structure in each of the two regions 120, 130 respectively. In the memory cell region 120, the formed gate structure comprises a tunnel oxide layer 102b, a silicon nitride electron-capturing layer 104b, a barrier oxide layer 106b and a poly-silicon layer 108b. In the periphery circuit region 130, on the other hand, the formed gate structure comprises a gate oxide layer 103a and a poly-silicon layer 108a. Further, the gate structures are used to be masks during the ion implantation forming the lightly doped drain regions 112b, 112a in the substrate 100 around the gate structures in regions 120 and 130, respectively.
Following that, referring to FIG. 1C, spacer walls 114b, 114a are formed surrounding the gate structures in the memory region 120 and the periphery circuit region 130, respectively. The spacer walls 114b, 114a are then used as another mask of implantation to form the source and drain regions 116b, 116a in the substrate 100, surrounding the spacer walls 114b, 114a. After this, one can precede with the metal wire layers and other backend processes to complete the memory processing.
In the above stated process steps of fabricating the memory device, the patterning of the poly-silicon is etched in one step for both memory region and periphery region, and following the poly-silicon etch is the etch for the oxide-nitride-oxide (Oxe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94O) layer in the memory region and the etch for the gate oxide in the periphery circuit region.
However, due to the big difference between the thickness and structures of Oxe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94O layer in the memory region and that of the gate oxide layer in the periphery circuit region, and provided that the gate oxide thickness is getting thinner and thinner for the 0.25 xcexcm process and under, it is difficult to control the etching to completely etch through the Oxe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94O structure without lowering (or pitting) the substrate surface in the periphery circuit region by over-etching the gate oxide. In order to solve the above process issue, another existing method is separating the poly-silicon etch step into two steps for the periphery circuit region and the memory region, insuring the completeness of the device. However, this method must use one additional photolithography mask, thus adding process complexity.
Therefore, it is an object of the invention is to provide a SONOS memory device structure and its fabrication method, so as to solve the problem of having damaged substrate surface in the periphery circuit region during poly-silicon etch.
It is another object of the invention to provide a memory device structure and its fabrication method, so as to reduce process complexity.
The invention provides a method of fabricating a memory device. The method includes the following steps. First, from the substrate and up, a tunnel oxide layer, a silicon nitride layer and a barrier silicon oxide layer are formed consecutively. A conductive layer is formed right on top of the last silicon oxide layer. This conductive layer is then patterned, and, at the same time the silicon oxide layer is also patterned, exposing the silicon nitride layer. Following that, a blanket dielectric layer is formed on top, covering the gate layer and the silicon nitride layer. This dielectric layer is then defined by using one etch step to form a spacer wall on the sides of the gate layer. During this etch step, the silicon nitride layer not covered by the spacer wall can be advantageously etched away and form the silicon nitride electron capturing layer. Note that the width of the formed electron-capturing layer is larger than that of the conductive gate layer. The current invention also includes forming a source/drain area in the substrate around the spacer, and forming a silicide layer on top of the gate layer to reduce the gate contact resistance.
The invention provides a method of fabricating a memory device. The method includes the following steps. First, a substrate is provided which has a memory region and a periphery circuit region. Secondly, an oxide layer is formed on the surface of the substrate, and a silicon nitride layer and another dielectric layer are formed on top of the oxide layer at only the memory region. After that, a conductive layer is formed on top of the dielectric layer at the memory region and the oxide layer at the periphery circuit region. This conductive layer is then patterned to form a first gate at the memory region and a second gate at the periphery circuit region. During this patterning step, the dielectric layer at the memory region and the oxide layer at the periphery circuit region are also patterned in the same step, exposing the silicon nitride layer in the memory region. A blanket dielectric layer is then formed on top, covering the first gate, the silicon nitride layer, and the second gate in both regions. Following that, an etch step is used to pattern the blanket dielectric layer and form a spacer on the sidewall of the first gate, and form another spacer on the sidewall of the second gate. During this patterning step, the silicon nitride layer in the memory region not covered by the spacer is also removed, forming the silicon nitride electron-capturing layer. Note that the width of the formed electron-capturing layer is larger than that of the conductive gate layer. The current invention also includes forming a source/drain area in the substrate around the spacer, and forming a suicide layer on top of the gate layer to reduce the gate contact resistance.
The invention also provides a memory device structure, which includes a substrate, a tunnel oxide layer, a silicon nitride electron-capturing layer, an oxide layer, a conductive gate layer and a silicon nitride spacer wall. In this structure, the tunnel oxide layer is deposed above the substrate surface. The silicon nitride electron-capturing layer is deposed above and in contact with the tunnel oxide layer. The conductive gate layer is deposed above a portion of the electron-capturing layer. The width of the electron-capturing layer is larger than that of the conductive gate layer. The oxide layer is deposed in between the gate layer and the silicon nitride electron-capturing layer so as to isolate the conductive gate layer and the silicon nitride electron-capturing layer. In addition, the silicon nitride spacers are deposed above the silicon nitride electron-capturing layer and on the sidewalls of the conductive gate layer and the silicon oxide layer. The current invention also includes forming a source/drain area in the substrate around the spacer, and forming a silicide layer on top of the gate layer to reduce the gate contact resistance.
In the method of fabricating the SONOS memory device in the current invention, during the step of patterning the poly-silicon layer, the top silicon oxide layer of the stack of silicon oxide-silicon nitride-tunnel oxide is patterned, stopping on the silicon nitride layer, thereby avoiding damaging the substrate of the periphery circuit region during the etching process.
Furthermore, in the method of fabricating the SONOS memory device in the current invention, because the etch step can be processed at the same time for both memory region and the periphery circuit region, there is then no need for an extra photo/etch step, thereby simplifying the process and making it suitable for the embedded processing.
Also, in the SONOS memory device structure of the current invention, the silicon nitride electron-capturing layer is larger. As a result, more electron-capturing area is provided, thereby increasing the threshold voltage window during programming.